Econ 101: Terms - Locavore and Frugality

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Food is going up in costs. Multiple nations are restricting the exporting of food, which will exacerbate the situation. There is a fear that there maybe a systemic crisis, as the US dollar moves out of the Worlds Reserve Currency status. Frugal and locavore are two terms to know, sooner, better then later.

Local food (also regional food or food patriotism) or the local food movement is a "collaborative effort to build more locally based, self-reliant food economies - one in which sustainable food production, processing, distribution and consumption is integrated to enhance the economic, environmental and social health of a particular place" [1] and is considered to be a part of the broader sustainability movement. It is part of the concept of local purchasing and local economies, a preference to buy locally produced goods and services. Those who prefer to eat locally grown/produced food sometimes call themselves "localvores" or locavores. [2]

While waiting in an office in West Virginia, I started a conversation with a 25-ish country bumpkin manning the reception desk. She had some hunting, farming and fishing photos around her desk. I asked her about land prices / house prices in her AOR. She and her husband bought a house and 60acres of land for about $160k pre-bubble. She did not know now what they would go for now.

She told me they planted most of the acres, vegetables and canned them. They had a couple of horses and hunted during the season. They had shot and killed deer from their back porch. (Deers will eat up your garden).

I was envious; I have been hunting for a farm. They are not cheap. Farm land has risen from $2k to +10k an acre. The ultimate meltdown insurance is a farm in Lancaster, PA.

I looked there, they are incredibly expensive. Amish do not like to sell land and there are restrictions on what people can buy. Living around the Amish would be the ultimate insurance if there was a meltdown.

:) The Amish idea was orginial to me while I was traveling there. But then I heard of a couple of hedge fund guys, who owned land there after 9-11. I did not buy into the Y2K, but I do see a severe recession in bound to the US.

Do you feel this movement of countries into anti-globalization?

Countries care about nationial interest. The US is selling debt, it "needs" a globalization dogma to do this.

Some guard their nationial interest better then others. If a country needs to export something, it wants "free trade" if the country wants to produce something locally they will find a way to ban the imported products or make the import so expensive compared to locally produced goods.

Example: Japan and Italy limit franchises coming into their countries to protect local businesses. Both also have high tarifs on imported goods. There is a book called Bad Samaritian, which discusses this.

Many countries and people in the world are not impacted by globalization. In Italy, where I lived almost everything was still made in Italy. Seriously, if you went to Auchans (Italy's WalMart) and looked at labels most of the items were Made in Italy on the back label. They block foreign mopeds, cars, bikes, etc.... more people drive Ducattis and Vespa then other motor bikes. Fiat is one of the most popular cars. There are some imports, but they are rare.

The best book/propaganda on globalization is " The World is Flat". It is a must read in todays business world.

There will undoubtedly be a slowdown from the unsustainable levels of growth, but what are thou thoughts?

My thought is we are in uncharted territory, and the US will go into a severe recession. Peter Schiff, Marc Faber, George Soros and Jim Rogers, who I like and follow are bearish on the dollar and the US consumption based economy. I think the US has been selling assets to support its consumption, at some point it will run out of assets to sell.

As Buffet said the US is like the son of a rich farmer, who is selling the land instead of farming it. At some point our kids will be serfs or tenant farmers of someone elses land. But the US has created a warfare/welfare state that is unsustainable. It needs to correct.